Throughout the canton of Ticino, Switzerland there are wonderful old houses with stone roofs. Simple construction dating from the 14th century remain intact to this day. The local peasants would build their homes from the only material available to them at a reasonable cost. The stones cleared from the mountainsides for farming and planting were used. Walls amd roofs were constructed with the help of timber to support the weight of sometimes two (2) mitres of snow.

Most of the churches in the area were also constructed with this amazing roof cover. Sometimes the original roofs are still intact on a very few of the old churches but the majority of them have been destroyed by fires, etc.

Newer construction of the old methods are being done but the effect is not the same. It is odvious that the regular pattern of the stones is not man made but machine cut.
Michael Kröger August 1981.